One Down - 49 To GoAuthor: BobRDate:02/03/2016 14:06:55

It's been a couple days since the Iowa caucuses, and the results will depend upon whom you talk to. On the Republican side, Ted Cruz won, but really - Marco Rubio won because he beat expectations. Trump lost, but gave an uncharacteristic nice concession "speech". On the Democratic side, Clinton won, even though it was pretty much a tie, but actually Sanders won because he too beat expectations. If your head is spinning, it's because of all the spin coming from the campaigns and their supporters.

The results on the Republican side were fairly definitive. There was no real controversy with the results, nor with the process used to create them. The Democratic side, however, is a whole 'nuther story...

As we've seen leading up to this moment, there are rabid supporters for both Clinton and Sanders, and they are all stinking up the blogosphere with their name-calling, taunting, paranoid conspiracy theories, and general bad behavior and absolutist rhetoric. The scorched-earth insanity has been difficult to read. With such a close finish, the ugliness has been ratcheted up even more. Supporters of Sanders have accused the Clinton campaign of "cheating", and Sanders hasn't helped in that regard.

Part of the problem is that about 12 delegates were decided by a coin flip because the caucus precinct was at a loggerhead with equal numbers of votes for Sanders and Clinton. Settling the vote by coin flip is not unprecedented. What didn't help was that a story began circulating that Clinton won 6 out of 6 coin flips, indicating that she MUST have cheated. This, coupled with a YouTube video showing Sanders winning a coin flip at one of the precincts sent the Sanders supporters into paroxysms of indignant rage at the thought that Clinton and the DNC was secretly working to "steal" Iowa.

Get a grip people - if you don't like the results, work harder to encourage people to vote for your candidate. In case you weren't aware, demonizing the opposing candidate does not work very well, and may tend to alienate voters who might have been inclined to vote for your candidate if you weren't such a dick about it.

I still fail to understand the unearned importance placed upon the Iowa caucuses. Yes, they are the first, but in the history of campaigns, they have had statistically zero impact on the final primary results (not to mention the general election). Just take a look: